The Myre
Family of Bornholm

compiled by:

Norman Lee Madsen

The
following is the result of my attempt to gather together and examine as much
information on the Bornholm Myre-family in the 1400s and 1500s as I could
find. That period is one in which there is little documentation, much controversy, and even more opinions!

The Myre-family according to
Dr. Marius Kristian Zahrtmann:

Bornholm
historian Dr. M.K. Zahrtmann (1861-1940) wrote in his article about the Uf and
Myre families of Bornholm that the Myre-family of Bornholm stems from the noble
Myre-family in Skåne (a.k.a. Scania, in Sweden). He relates that after 1060, when Bishop
Egino from Dalby Abbey came to Bornholm to convert the Bornholmer's to Christianity, the 6 & 20
Vdg. in Ibsker were given as a gift to Dalby Abbey, which in 1303 transfered
ownership of them to Lund Cathedral. The farms must have been transfered to Frimand (Freeman) Truid
Myre, for after his death a probate judgement, dated June 29, 1489, transfered
the farm (then known as Fuglsangsgård) to his son Peder Myre; also mentioned in
the probate was Peder Myre’s half-sister Karine. The farm was later known as Gaggegård, and is
now known as Østre Klintegård and is one of the Klinteby-farms.

Zahrtmann
also writes that Jørgen Gagge’s wife Margrete is the daughter of Chief Justice
Peder Hansen Uf and Mette Hansdatter Myre. Stating that Jørgen Gagge took over the management of his
father-in-law’s farm, Simlegård, after Peder Hansen Uf’s death; and that in
1601 he had a churchbell cast for St. Klemen’s Church, which was decorated with
the coat of arms of the Uf and Myre families.

The Myre-family according to
Edvard Skovgaard:

Edvard
Skovgaard relates in his in his pedigree "1000 Aner til en
Skovgårdsslægt" (published in 1989) that Mette Hansdatter, the wife of
Chief Justice Peder Hansen Uf (1536-1596) of Simlegård in Klemensker, was a
member of the Myre-family.

The family known as “Myre on
Bornholm” and their emblem is known from Hans Myre's seal. He died in 1518 as the last male of that
family on Bornholm, but he had a sister, Bodil, who married a man named Jacob
of the family Kyrning-Myre. Their descendants took the name Myre only, and some of them resided on Bornholm as
well. Mette Hansdatter was the last member of the Bornholm Myre-family (myre is Danish for ant), she was the
daughter of Hans Myre, they had a design with three black ants on a white
shield in their coat of arms, and the helmet had two white vesselhorns. Peder Hansen (Uf)'s coat of arms seem to
have brought some confusion for researchers, because it appears that Jørgen
Gagge and his wife Margrethe put up yet another memorial to honour Peder Hansen
(Uf) and Mette Hansdatter. Jørgen Gagge and his wife Margrethe Pedersdatter had a
memorial made in 1601 to honour her parents: Peder Hansen (Uf) and “Mette
Hans Pedersens Datter” (Hans Pedersen’s daughter Mette). This was in the form of a large church bell
for the church in Klemensker parish, which later disappeared - probably melted
down for its metal. Laurids de Thurah reports (published in 1756 - he was an official on Bornholm) that
"paa den største Klokke findes tvende Vaabener, det ene med et Spende udi, som ventelig er de Adelige
Koefoders; Det andet med en Giedde Kieft udi" (on the large bell you find
engraved two coats of arms, one carries the chevron, the emblem of the noble
Koefods, the other carries the pike’s jawbone).

Unfortunately nothing is noted about an upside-down
chevron, but there is a reference to the Kofoed-family, who carried a blue chevron
on a red background with 2 white vesselhorns. Danmarks Kirker (volume 7) tells the same, but lists those coats
of arms as the property of the Gagge and Splid families.

M.K. Zahrtmann (well versed in all the
Bornholm-families) writes in “Optegnelser om Almegård i Knudsker sogn” (Bornholmske
Samlinger, volume 21): “Jørgen Gagge gave a beautiful memorial in honour
of his parents-in-law Peder Hansen Uf and Mette Hansdatter Myre, because in
1601 he had cast a large church-bell, engraved with the Uf-family's
chevron-emblem and the Myre-family's crawling ant.” Yes, Zahrtmann knew very well which families this pertained
to, and has deliberately made the correction from the “Giedde Kieften”
(a geddekæft or pike’s jawbone, a.k.a. halv hummerklo or half a
lobster-claw) to one crawling ant - but as we know the Myre coat of arms
carried three ants! Zahrtmann never did see the bell for himself, so we must believe Thurah's impartial account of the
above, and say that the very same set of shields which today can be seen on the
pew-door must have been engraved on the church-bell! Thus we are ensured that it can not be a mistake incurred later
if the pew is a copy of the original.

From the 1987 article “Landsdommer Patriciatet på Bornholm” – part 1:

In this article Sigvard Mahler Dam states that Oluf
Ottesen (Uf) probably married a daughter of Hans Myre, of Klinteby in Ibsker,
and along with her inherited her family-farm, which became part of the
Uf-family property for several generations. Their only child was named Hans Olufsen.
Oluf Ottesen is first mentioned, alongside his father, as a
witness to a private deed of conveyance on August 10th 1497, and he was so
young that he did not have a seal of his own and so he placed his father’s seal
under his signature; later he would cease using Uf family-name altogether. Oluf is mentioned several more times in the
following years in his official capacity as chief justice, the last time on May
22nd 1522 when he, together with a number of “good men” from the Landsting,
witnessed that Jørgen Hals and his two sisters, Anne and Else, are legitimate
and rightful heirs after Anders Galen of Lund. Below this document his seal is well preserved, and we can see the
Uf-family coat of arms, with its chevron on the shield, and the helmet with its
two vessel-horns.

A legend from 1625, which was revived in a Bornholm
journal in 1804, tells that the Lübeck commander, Bernt Knop, was ill treating
the Bornholmers, which is why “Landsdommeren Hans Jenssøn i Nylarsker”
travelled to see the king and complain. He returned with a royal order that they must take care of the commander
on their own. So they gathered together a band at Egele, south of Åkirkeby, to fight against the
Lübeckers, but they were defeated and many were slain; this event probably happened in 1536.
Some stories tell us that the chief justice thereafter had his head chopped off. Dean Jens Pedersen’s
description of “some strange happenings on Bornholm” written in 1625, and printed in Bornholmske Samlinger
(volume 17, 1926, page 65) provides the chief justice’s name, and in P.N. Skovgaard’s “Bornholms
Beskrivelse” (pub. 1804, page 293), there is an authentic rendering of the
dean’s account from 1625. The decapitation was mentioned by Zahrtmann (“Bornholms Frimænd” in Bornholmske
Samlinger”, volume 16, 1920, pages 120-159), the original source for this
account unknown; later complaints by Bornholmers about the Lübeckers includes
one from a farmer that his brother, Hans Jensen, had been decapitated;
if this was Zahrtmann’s source, it seems very unlikely that such an event took
place: peasants were not the targets, and furthermore, the chief justice’s name
was incorrect!

In any case, the tradition must have interchanged
his given name with his patronymic, as can be seen from a high court document
which display’s his seal. In 1537 there was a fight over Myregård in Åker,
and Hans Borreby’s widow Anne came forth with a high court judgement, the document was sealed
by Chief Justice Jens Hansen, we can assume that this judgement must have been passed around
1533. The insurrection against Lübeck was not in 1536, but in 1535. This
might indicate that the chief justice’s name was correctly Jens Hansen,
and that he lost his position (possibly executed or fled?) because of his
incitement of the uprising – as we know the exact date of the appointment of
his successor. Furthermore, this dramatic ending to his career (and maybe his life) meant that all his property
was confiscated and placed under the juridiction of Hammershus – so we can not trace his descendants by
seeing who were his heirs. The connection to Nylars parish might lead us to Myregård, which is nearby to the
small fishing village of Arnager, which the Myre-family, and especially Truid Myre of Myregård
in Olsker, tried to take back from the Lübeckers. Which could mean that Jens Hansen was the
brother-in-law of the earlier chief justice, Oluf Ottesen (Uf), and thus the son of Hans Myre of Klinteby
(6 Vdg.) in Ibsker parish.

The name Jens is quite commonly used by the
Myre-family. We might also conclude that Jens Hansen was the father of Mads Kofoed’s first wife,
Johanne, the mother of the later chief justice, Jens Kofoed; which would explain whom he was
named after. If this hypotheses about Jens Hansen’s origins is correct, it would appear that he was the last male
descendant of the “gamle Myrer” (elder Myre-family), which carried the
arms depicting the three“myrer” (ants) on their shield. The “yngre Myrer” (younger
Myre-family) was in fact a branch of the Kyrning family of Skåne, whose arms
depict a star. Hans Myre’s seal of 1513 shows a shield depicting three crawling ants, and a helmet with two
vesselhorns. The colours of which are known from various publications about coats of arms: on a white background are
three red ants and a helmet with two white vesselhorns.

From the 1988 article “Landsdommer Patriciatet på Bornholm” – part 2:

In this article Sigvard Mahler Dam states that Peder
Hansen (Uf) was born in 1536 and died 60 years of age in 1596, a tablet, which
once hung in St. Klemen’s Church, stated this to remind the congregation. His father’s father was Chief Justice Oluf
Ottesen (Uf), and his father’s mother was possibly a sister of Chief Justice
Jens Hansen (Myre). His wife, Mette Hansdatter, was a niece of Chief Justice Laurids Pedersen; and his father’s
nephew was Chief Justice Mogens Uf.

Peder Hansen (Uf) and family lived at Simlegård in
Klemensker parish, which still is one of the largest farms on Bornholm, and the
family owned vast estates. The couple had 2 daughters: Margrethe, who married Jørgen
Gagge of Almegård in Knudsker parish; and Merete, married to Hans Grabow of Pederstrup, who came to settle on
Bornholm. The Uf-family estate was divided between these two families, of which the Gagges are the only ones to
stay on Bornholm, while Merete’s stepson, Jochum Grabow, sold all his estate and moved away from the island.

Jens Kofoed (died 1625) and his older brother Peder
were present at the church in Åkirkeby in 1572 when the king’s envoys gathered
all the Freemen. Peder Kofoed presided at court in Hammershus on the 12th of April 1570 in the chief justice’s place,
and a promising future career as chief justice was ended by his early death in
the 1570s. Jens and Peder, and their two sisters, Boel and Annicke, were the children of Mattis Kofoed (Mads
Kofoed) and Johanne, who was probably the daughter of Chief Justice Jens Hansen
(Myre).

A gravestone can still be found in Olsker Church for
Truid Myre (-1551-1558-), who died at Myregård in Olsker on November 1,
1574. The carving of the shield is very worn and difficult to make out, but you can still make out 2 of the 3 ants on
Truid’s coat of arms and 2 vesselhorns. His wife’s coat of arms depicts "enhalvbue med nogle spidser"
(a crescent with several points) – a description also applicable to the
"hummerklo” – also with vesselhorn on the helmet, and according to the
chronology she may have been a daughter of Hans Pedersen of Bjergegård.

In Klemensker Church there is on display a special
seat, which previously had belonged to the owners of Simlegård and had
embellished their pew in the church. The seat has 2 carved and painted coat of arms with the initials “PH”
and “MHD”, which pertains to Chief Justice Peder Hansen (Uf) and his wife Mette
HansDatter. The Uf-family’s shield shows (an inverse, red chevron on a white field and 2 red vesselhorns on its
helmet), and his wife’s shield shows the Bjergegård-family’s geddekæft (pike’s
jawbone) or halve hummerklo (half lobster claw) coat of arms (a white
claw on a red field, and 2 white vesselhorns on the helmet).

Mette Hansdatter is mentioned in a high court
judgement, dated June 15, 1582 (Herredags Dombog nr. 11, DaRA), as being the
heir of Hans Myre, in a fight over Fuglsangsgård in Ibsker. However, this does not necessarily mean she
is his daughter, as Hans Myre was first mentioned in 1511 and was dead by 1531,
and she could hardly have been of age at that time. Hans Myre could possibly be a relative of Peder Myre, who was
mentioned in 1489, and therefore we might assume that Lars and Hans Pedersen’s
mother was the daughter of Hans Myre, which harmonizes with the fact that Bendt
Hansen in 1565 was residing in Ibsker (at Fuglsangsgård?), which his
brother-in-law Peder Hansen (Uf) later bought from him.

The
identity of Freeman Hans Myre (-1518-) of Fuglsangsgård, 6 Vdg. Ibsker, his
children and grandchildren have been the source of much speculation and
confusion over the years. This was brought about because of the fact that there was another Freeman named Hans
Pedersen on Bornholm in the mid-1500s. This other Hans Pedersen (-1522-1536-1543-) has been identified by
Sigvard Mahler Dam as a member of what he has named the “Bjergegaard-family”,
and his identity is based largely on a reinterpretation of the so called hummerklo
arms. According to Sigvard the hummerklo is actually a geddekæft (pike's jawbone) image.
Confounding this matter is the fact that both Hans Pedersens had sons named Peder, namely: Peder Hansen Myre (-1547-,
died 1572) of Fuglsangsgård and Peder Hansen (-1572-) of Vellensgård in Nyker.

Two
of Hans Myre’s sons have been identified with high certainty, and a third can
be added with some confidance. The most certain is the heir to the family-farm of
Fuglsangsgård (and thus likely the youngest son), Peder Hansen Myre. The
other is Truid Myre is named in a 1551 lawsuit in Malmö, and in 1555 in another
lawsuit on Bornholm. He complained in 1558 to the king about Vassal (Lensmand) Lage Urne,
who was not pleased at Truid having freeman status. Sought in 1552 to lay entire Arnager
fishing village beneath his durisdiction, this attempt failed. On March 30, 1558 he was
the spokesman for Bornholm's freemen to King Christian the 3rd regarding
exemptions in payment of the land-assistance-tax (landehjælpeskat), the
exemptions were denied. Truid probably died without any living children, as his farms
(Store Myregård, 5 Vdg. Olsker; Lille Myregård, 6 Vdg. Olsker; Lille Myregård,
11 Slg. Nylars; Store Myregård, 10 Slg. Nylars; Ågård, 2 Vdg. Nylars;
Pæregård, 3 Vdg. Nylars) would later become part of Simlegård estate,
which was owned by Peder Hansen Uf and his wife Mette Hansdatter. Truid Myre died “Allerhelgens
aften” (November 1) 1574, and according to Sigvard Mahler Dam, his
gravestone was placed in “Ols kirkes våbenhus” (Olsker Church's entrance), and
although worn the 3 ants of the Myre arms, with two vesselhorns on the helmet,
can still be seen; also that the gravestone shows his wife's shield, which
depicts “enhalvbue med nogle spidser” (a crescent with several points),
with vesselhorns on the helmet - otherwise known as the hummerklo
(lobsterclaw) or geddekæft (pike's jawbone) arms of the
Bjergegaard-family.

The
third son is Jens Hansen Myre, mentioned in a document dated 1541 which
confures upon him the position of kannik (canon) in Lund. On July 4, 1574 he sold Myregård (a.k.a.
Lille Ølegård), 9 Vdg. Østermarie, and one farm in Klinteby (20 Vdg. Ibsker), to
Peder Oxe. He had a crookback (krogrygget) and died in Lund in 1575. This man is probably the same person as the
Jens Hansen who was chief justice for Bornholm circa 1533, who placed his seal on an undated
document (in 1533?) which was later presented in court in 1537 by Hans
Borreby's widow Anne with regards to her dispute over the ownership of Myregård
in Åker parish. In 1535 there was an unsuccessful uprising by the Bornholmers against their Lübeck
overlords, and the island's chief justice, a Jens Hansen of Nylars parish is said to
have been involved. He probably owned “Myregaard” (later called Ågård), 2 Vdg. Nylars,
a frivornedegård (free copyhold farm) - which is known to have been owned by Truid Myre.
Some accounts state the he was executed by the Lübeckers - but the facts on this seem doubtful.
It seems probable that Jens Hansen (Myre) fled the island in 1535, taking up the possition of canon in Lund
in 1541. Possibly he is the father of Mads Kofoed's first wife Johanne (died circa 1547)?

The
identification of two possible daughters of Hans Myre by Sigvard Mahler Dam is
pure speculation based on circumstantial evidence. Various other researcher have incorrectly
stated that “Mette Hans Pedersens Datter” was the daughter of Hans Pedersen Myre (including
Sigvard Mahler Dam in 1982, changing his mind at a later date) - based soley on
the fact that Mette and her husband Peder Hansen (Uf) owned Fuglsangsgård in
1574. A court document dated June 15, 1582 concerning a dispute over Fuglsangsgård states
that Mette Hansdatter was an heir of Hans Myre (-1518-). The Sigvard’s assertion that Mette is
the daughter of Hans Pedersen of the so called “Bjergegaard-family” is, in my mind, all but proven
by the evidence that the arms painted on the church pew door in Klemensker were a sparre (the
Uf-family’s image) and a geddekæft/hummerklo (the Bjergegaard-family’s
image). His case is further bolstered by the fact that Hans Pedersen’s brother is known to have resided in Ibsker in
1565, although I know of no evidence to support the assertion that Bendt Hansen
sold Fuglsangsgård to Peder Hansen (Uf). This forces Mette’s connection to the Myre-family back at least one
generation, from father to grandparent.

Sigvard’s
identification of a second daughter is based soley on the speculation that the
position of chief justice on Bornholm was kept as an inherited family position
by a small clique of Freemen families during the 1500s; and so he speculates
that Chief Justice Oluf Ottesen’s wife might be the daughter of Hans Myre, and
that they named their son Hans after her father. This would also explain how their grandson Peder Hansen (Uf), and
his wife Mette Hansdatter, managed to inherit the majority of the Myre-family’s
farms. These same farms were later inherited by their daughter Margrethe/Marete Pedersdatter (c.1555-1624).

The first generation:

[1] Peder Myre (-1429-) of Bornholm – a Freeman,
used the three ants image in 1429

The second generation:

[2] Truid Myre (probate held June 29, 1489) of Fuglsangsgård, 6 Vdg.
Ibsker, married at least twice – a Freeman {possibly the son of [1] Peder Myre}